January 5th - Sunsets and Rainbows

    Those of you who follow my blog will know I have been a bit stressed this week, In my last post (click here to read) I mentioned that I am travelling to Florida for work on Monday, other people have been passing their worries and stresses about the trip onto me. Well worry not as I have those stresses under control and I am in a much better place mentally. This is partly due to the fact that I managed to get my issues written down in this blog, so thanks for letting me vent. 

    Another reason I have managed to deal with this stress is the kind words of friends around me, I have had some lovely support from my other half Nat, a wonderful supportive message from Tim and a good chat with Ann too, all these little things make me realise that I am doing the right thing and that no one really means to pass their stresses onto me, its actually nice that people are concerned.

    The final reason I have dealt with the stress is because of some awesome cold adventures. It started off on Tuesday by getting to the beach nice and early for a pre swim run along the sand at low tide.  When I left my car it was dry and sunny and not too cold but once I reached the far end of the beach the heavens opened and I got drenched, the plus side being that I didn't have a t-shirt on to get wet and it only lasted for a few minutes. The moment the rain stopped I was treated to a glorious (yet small) rainbow on the horizon ahead of me, it was so bright and welcoming.

    This little rainbow made me think of the quote by Dolly Parton "The way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.", I think this is a wonderful quote, our lives are full of happy moments but we cant have those all the time, we all need to deal with the rough moments to really appreciate those happy ones. I followed the awesome rainbow run with a lovely dip in the sea with Ann, we weren't in too long but it was just about long enough. 

    Today I had decided that I was going to wait until later in the afternoon for my swim, I live near a lovely nature reserve with a path around the edge of it which is exactly 3 miles, and so it makes for a great little run. I aimed to do the run at sunset, I figured it would be quieter as most of the walkers would have gone home by then, I headed off away from the car park and was immediately treated to some incredible views of the sky, the colours were vivid and the reflections in the water were almost perfect. 

    The entire 3 mile run was really good, it had turned rather chilly but I managed the cold fine and no one really took any notice of me without my shirt on. I was left at the end feeling much more positive about my trip away and for the first time I am actually looking forward to it.